My new job, marketing listings! Teach me....PLEASE!

Marketing
#1

Hey all, Happy Friday!

Been 20 years of DOING lead gen for buyers and sellers and you might say that’s gone… meh “OK” :smiley:

But I have a new job, and that is actually helping to “sell” listings.

As you may or may not know, my wife @Carly is a Realtor here in Nanaimo where we live and I am her webmaster / director of marketing. Fun right?

Well, she is kicking butt! (she has over $3M in listings this month) but now I have a “new” challenge. We’re great at overall buyer lead gen, and we’re great at getting listings (clearly) but now what do I do to help them get sold?

Note: Our listings are generally mid to high end (so like $500k-$1.5M in our area) we have not taken on and don’t target low priced homes, condos etc

So here is what we’re doing (among other things) so far.

Professional Photography (imagine that lol)

Enhanced listings details pages: Example https://www.carlycarey.com/listing/465486-3686-dolphin-drive-parksville-homes-for-sale-1100000/

High end videos 3686 Dolphin Drive, Nanoose Bay - YouTube

Social posts: Instagram, FB, etc on her channel, cross channel, shares

Boost listings & videos to targeted social groups

Personal bomb bomb’s to other agents who have been involved in similar transactions within the past 90-120 days (they may have the perfect buyer that missed out on a property still in market)

Custom social graphics

Google adwords campaigns specific to the regions of our listings

MLS (yup that too!)

Post on internal RE/MAX channels

Broker open houses (catering to make sure the brokers come!)

There is more but I’d love to get this thread started and find out what more we can be doing (systematically) to get the most exposure and get our listings sold!

Side note (weird quirk about our market) we’re in BC, so dual agency is not permitted, thus generally buyers direct on “our own” listings is not as advantageous as in other markets (don’t get me wrong we still do it as we want the property sold and can refer out the leads) but it’s 25% not 100 so ROI on ad spend etc is not the same in that scenario.

Thanks in advance for your thoughts.

2 Likes
#2

It looks like you have most angles covered. I’ll give you a couple of tips we use.

  1. Pricing - This is different than value. Most Realtors will price their listings like they are a retail product. For instance, a $1,000,000 listing they will list at $999,900. This eliminates 50% of the exposure of the listing. Consumers in this price range will usually search from $750k (even as low as $500k) to $1,000,000. The other search is $1,000,000 to $1,500,000. Anyone searching in the second group would never see the listing.

Also, would consumers like to buy in the top end of their price range or the bottom end. Ever consumer I have ever asked this question to says bottom. With the listing at $999,900, anyone seeing this house it will be in the top of their price range and most likely it won’t be the first home they want to see. However, listed at $1,000,000 it will now be at the bottom end of the second search criteria which is going to get more activity than being at the top.

  1. When I have a listing that isn’t getting any traffic, I lower the price every Thursday at 5pm by $50. This resets the Internet cycle each week. When you first list a property, it goes out to all the other websites and portals. However, it only does that once. By lowering the price on Thursdays, the listing will show up on Friday mornings on the consumer listing updates feed every week. Therefore much more exposure for your listing.

I hope that helps a little. Both strategies have worked great for our agents!

#3

Great tips @Mitch thank you!

Question: how are your sellers with doing paperwork every Thursday on the price reductions? I guess if you tell them in advance and they agree it’s not a big deal?

PS: $1M listing on Monday becomes at $999,950 on thursday :stuck_out_tongue: haha

#4

We actually do the paperwork once and have it say we will lower the price every Thursday $50.

Keep in mind, we only do this if we are not getting any action on the listing and usually after 3 weeks to a month. If we aren’t getting any traffic, the pricing thing doesn’t matter! Now it’s just about it recycling through the Internet for more traffic. Timing is market specific. We know that after 2 or 3 weeks with no traffic, in this market, we need to be more proactive.

#5

Question: I have a luxury listing that was listed last fall at a higher price. I did my research and I’d say the house is priced competitively. However, we are heading into the 3rd week of being on the market and I have not received a single showing request. I know it had a ton of showings last year. What can I do to generate showings/interest?

#6

Morgan,

In our due diligence, we identified your wife and your work with her. No issue on our part.

As you know, we focus on the top end of markets. Our clients are high net worth families, politicos, professional athletes, physicians, techies (Austin is our base) and nonprofit board members.

I suggest focusing on the market segment she is in. Candidly, we give new agents with other companies listings, buyers and leads for low end transactions. It does not make sense with our business model and investment in each listing.

Just $0.02 from Texas.

Best always.

SWPRE accepting real estate agent and broker applications

George Arnold Alexander, MPA, Broker Associate
CFO, SWPRE & SWPRE Philanthropy
m +1 713.918.9951
o +1 512.577.0079
e george@swpre.com
w https://swpre.com/

Legal notices: TREC Consumer Protection Notice Information About Brokerage Services